dictate your every word, you bright nymphs
mistake the possible. Thank you for the plangent
note, the sacrifices that were not at all intended
as an offering. The snare you prepared with the guile
of an anxious siren. If I was ungrateful, I was startle-
hitched. If I tried to be direct, or refused
to condemn, there was something knowledgeable.
Here we mistook the gun who was neither bodyguard
nor the decent acquisition of lymph-yielding limbs.
The rustic incursions of cellophane lips. There is nothing
in you that is not interrupted by flow in the opposite direction.
The capacity of an imperium is the power to command
but how can ridicule sustain this kind of asymmetry?
Why would I erase you when one fatal day I might find you
in your own dress? What more could I have to say to you
that is not a swarm of twentieth century cavalcade?
To pluralise one’s contractions with an apostrophe is a sign
of trustworthiness, the formal vanity of the tuxedoed
vernacular. Everything that is hidden becomes crucial.
So why do things light up when you go away, but go away
when you come near? I fear I must keep you with me at all
times, without knowing what this might suggest. The radical
social and cultural delinquency of thought shivvies,
asks ‘what if you are the envoy of smaller things?’
The problem is: you are prose and I am lacking a differential
topology of holes. Shooting out radicle sense-organs causes
arctic overload, you split into non-commodifiable units of
paraphrase. If you think of me at all it is to replicate
my need, harvested from the vertical Norwegian glassfields.
Everything I see and hear reminds me of you. Vegetables
left to rot in the car overnight, the boisterous dysrhythmia
of hunger. Extension du domaine de la lutte. Melodies
of songs that you wrote but never listened to. Tagging
the Elwood estuaries with a bag full of poppies, eating Pho
in a Vietnamese diner. Choosing between pale ale and desire.
Is this our ruination in reverse? We are carbon neutral,
paid-up members of the union at the end of history.
We are kosher. We are sweet. We are all doors open
for business. I see nothing in your eyes but pure belonging.
For those who have nothing it is forbidden not to relish filth.
Like a man who has seen too much, I am tamed in the snare
of an earlier desire. We are dreaming in tandem now,
in this life that is not a dream. Not fearful but minuscule, Decisive.
- 115: SPACE
with A Sometimes
114: NO THEME 13
with J Toledo & C Tse
113: INVISIBLE WALLS
with A Walker & D Disney
112: TREAT
with T Dearborn
111: BABY
with S Deo & L Ferney
110: POP!
with Z Frost & B Jessen
109: NO THEME 12
with C Maling & N Rhook
108: DEDICATION
with L Patterson & L Garcia-Dolnik
107: LIMINAL
with B Li
106: OPEN
with C Lowe & J Langdon
105: NO THEME 11
with E Grills & E Stewart
104: KIN
with E Shiosaki
103: AMBLE
with E Gomez and S Gory
102: GAME
with R Green and J Maxwell
101: NO THEME 10
with J Kinsella and J Leanne
100: BROWNFACE
with W S Dunn
99: SINGAPORE
with J Ip and A Pang
97 & 98: PROPAGANDA
with M Breeze and S Groth
96: NO THEME IX
with M Gill and J Thayil
95: EARTH
with M Takolander
94: BAYT
with Z Hashem Beck
93: PEACH
with L Van, G Mouratidis, L Toong
92: NO THEME VIII
with C Gaskin
91: MONSTER
with N Curnow
90: AFRICAN DIASPORA
with S Umar
89: DOMESTIC
with N Harkin
88: TRANSQUEER
with S Barnes and Q Eades
87: DIFFICULT
with O Schwartz & H Isemonger
86: NO THEME VII
with L Gorton
85: PHILIPPINES
with Mookie L and S Lua
84: SUBURBIA
with L Brown and N O'Reilly
83: MATHEMATICS
with F Hile
82: LAND
with J Stuart and J Gibian
81: NEW CARIBBEAN
with V Lucien
80: NO THEME VI
with J Beveridge
57.1: EKPHRASTIC
with C Atherton and P Hetherington
57: CONFESSION
with K Glastonbury
56: EXPLODE
with D Disney
55.1: DALIT / INDIGENOUS
with M Chakraborty and K MacCarter
55: FUTURE MACHINES
with Bella Li
54: NO THEME V
with F Wright and O Sakr
53.0: THE END
with P Brown
52.0: TOIL
with C Jenkins
51.1: UMAMI
with L Davies and Lifted Brow
51.0: TRANSTASMAN
with B Cassidy
50.0: NO THEME IV
with J Tranter
49.1: A BRITISH / IRISH
with M Hall and S Seita
49.0: OBSOLETE
with T Ryan
48.1: CANADA
with K MacCarter and S Rhodes
48.0: CONSTRAINT
with C Wakeling
47.0: COLLABORATION
with L Armand and H Lambert
46.1: MELBOURNE
with M Farrell
46.0: NO THEME III
with F Plunkett
45.0: SILENCE
with J Owen
44.0: GONDWANALAND
with D Motion
43.1: PUMPKIN
with K MacCarter
43.0: MASQUE
with A Vickery
42.0: NO THEME II
with G Ryan
41.1: RATBAGGERY
with D Hose
41.0: TRANSPACIFIC
with J Rowe and M Nardone
40.1: INDONESIA
with K MacCarter
40.0: INTERLOCUTOR
with L Hart
39.1: GIBBERBIRD
with S Gory
39.0: JACKPOT!
with S Wagan Watson
38.0: SYDNEY
with A Lorange
37.1: NEBRASKA
with S Whalen
37.0: NO THEME!
with A Wearne
36.0: ELECTRONICA
with J Jones